Nature of Matter

Anything which has mass and occupies space is called matter. Everything around us — a book, a pen, a pencil, water, air, and all living beings — is composed of matter: each has mass, and each occupies space.

You are already familiar with the term matter, and with the three states in which it exists, from your earlier classes. Before building the quantitative ideas of this chapter, it is worth recalling two things about matter that the next two subsections take up in turn: the states in which matter exists (solid, liquid and gas, Section 1.2.1) and …